Dutton says $24 billion from public service jobs will pay for bulk-billing boost

Opposition Leader Peter Dutton says he will slash $24 billion from public service spending to pay for his $9 billion injection into Medicare, doubling down on plans to cull tens of thousands of public servants so he can match Labor’s health spending while still promising smaller government.

The Coalition has refused to say the precise number of jobs it will cut if elected, but Dutton on Monday confirmed that he would find the money for free GP visits by targeting the 36,000 workers Labor has added to the public service since elected.

Opposition Leader Peter Dutton.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen

“Under the Labor Party [there are] 36,000 additional public servants, that’s at a cost of $6 billion a year, or $24 billion over the forward estimates. This program totals $9 billion over that period. So, we’ve well and truly identified the savings,” he said.

“The $9 billion not only is it counted for, but we have got a productivity gain, because I just don’t think more and more layers of approval and bureaucratic process out of Canberra is helping anyone.”

The opposition’s decision to match Labor’s $8.5 billion bulk-billing incentives for GPs – a policy first proposed by the Greens – is designed to fight off the government’s escalating attack on Dutton’s record as health minister, when he tried to cut rebates and introduce mandatory co-payments.

It puts Dutton under pressure to explain the details of his plans to reduce spending and maintain government services, while also finding space for the Coalition’s promises, such as its nuclear power energy plan.

Dutton insisted he was across the policy detail of the Medicare announcement on Monday, after Prime Minister Anthony Albanese accused him of acting on “thought bubbles” without developing his own policies and following Labor’s lead.

Andrew Carswell, Scott Morrison’s former media chief, said Dutton’s decision to match Albanese dollar-for-dollar was a clear political calculation to get health off the table ahead of the election.

“It neutralises a tricky political issue for the Coalition and blunts the attack of the Albanese government. They’re political equations, not policy considerations,” he said.

While arguing the Albanese government has pumped up public servant numbers as a favour to unions, Dutton has not explained which departments would be targeted. Getting rid of 36,000 public servants equates to almost a fifth of the public service.

One of the largest increases to the public service has come from about 3500 new jobs at the National Disability Insurance Agency to detect fraud and overpayments – a key reason the cost of the scheme has started to stabilise after surging up to 20 per cent a year.

Another 2800 have been added to the Defence Department, while 542 people have been employed in the Australian Submarine Agency to oversee the bipartisan $368 billion AUKUS submarine project.

Almost 2500 have been added to the Health Department itself – staff the government says are delivering urgent care clinics and general practice incentive payments. The Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission has boosted its workforce by just under 1000 to oversee the nation’s nursing homes after the royal commission identified widespread neglect, while almost 2000 new workers in the Veterans’ Affairs department are cutting a 60,000 long waitlist delivering payments promised to veterans.

There have also been substantial additions to the Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water and personnel have been boosted in small institutions such as the National Library, the National Film and Sound Archive and the National Archives.

Dutton has promised there will be no cuts to “frontline services” but has otherwise not specified which jobs will be protected. “We are not cutting frontline positions,” he said earlier this month. “I want more money going to frontline services. I want more money going to health and education.”

He originally named cultural diversity and inclusion roles as prime for cutting, but departments employ just a handful of staff in those roles, as revealed in a survey of government departments by this masthead.

Finance Minister Katy Gallagher defended the government’s handling of the budget, saying it had improved by $200 billion and recorded two surpluses, saving billions of dollars in interest payments.

She signalled more savings, and spending promises, were on the government’s agenda.

“We’ve found savings. We’ve found reprioritisations within the budget. We’ve stopped programs that weren’t delivering or haven’t got continuing investment in those. And we’ll continue to do that,” she told ABC Radio.

More spending may be coming in the housing sector, as Albanese highlighted the need for more homes while campaigning in the Labor-held Melbourne seat of Chisholm on Monday.

“We need approvals, we need higher densities, including appropriate development around public transport links, and that will be important going forward [to achieve] increased housing supply. We’ll have more to say about housing during the election campaign,” he said.

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